There's been a lot of harsh comments about the performance. I thought overall it was good from both sides. What was lacking was creativity to unlock two fantastic defences. From their point of view Shaun Johnson is a huge miss.

Looking at England we need someone to give us a bit of spark. The halves, hull back and hookers need to offer a bit more. Tha halves are a difficult one. I think Widdop is sacrificing part of his own game to cover for the inexperience of Williams. Williams is a cracking young player but I think SM is asking bit much of him to guide an England side around against a very good NZ after 1 season of SL. That said we need to work on combinations so I'd stick with those two for the third test. Hardaker needs to join the line more and offer some sort of attacking threat. His defence has been solid as we all knew he would be but he has offered no threat in attack. The hookers again have been solid but need to step up another level.

The only change I would be looking to make is to put Bateman into the SR. He's not done anything wrong at centre but Cudjoe would probably give NZ more to think about.

That's true, but sadly that is the nature of sport and what makes it different to the entertainment industry. Sometimes it follows the script but usually it doesn't. This idea that you can somehow create marketing spectaculars is a myth - be great if you could - then again maybe not.

You just have to take the rough with the smooth.

I guess Immanuel Kant was right, we really do create our own reality.